X06: The Peter Moore Interview

At the tail end of X06 day two, IGN sat down with the congenial, smooth-talking English Peter Moore, one of many Microsoft's balding vice presidents, to gain some perspective on the company's recent announcements. He addressed the state of the PlayStation 3 more than a few times. He tried his hardest to answer the technical differences between native 1080p with and without an HDMI out port, confronted issues about delayed games, went on and on about emerging markets in Bangladesh, South America and India, and was assertive when explaining why Microsoft hasn't lost the Japanese market yet. In short, we had a relatively standard talk with the corporate face of Microsoft's Xbox 360, with a few exceptions.

IGN's behind-closed-doors appointment comprised several other Websites and magazines, so the crowd and the questions were mixed. Moore's meeting with us took place at day's end, where we found at this him surlier but no less entertaining than normal. Thanks to the late timing of the meeting, the entire interview process was more boisterous and chaotic than normal, which made it more fun, but a little less easy to follow. We have marked the questions with "Q" to represent the questions asked by the attending journalists.

Q: So with Sony standing pat at its two price points, will we see price cuts or bundles moving forward in this holiday season in North America?

Peter Moore: Certainly not. There are no price cuts in the plan. Bundles are a different conversation because retailers instigate a bundle and do that on their own. They could have a tactical bundle, particularly with a game that they want to put with the bundle. That's their decision. There are no formal announcements about hard bundles, which emanate from the platformer holder.

Q: Continuing with the bundle idea, was the inclusion of King Kong DVD with the HD-DVD drive part of Microsoft's relationship with Peter Jackson?

Peter Moore: No, that was a broad initiative, a Universal Studios arrangement. Going down further into time, they are a great endorser of HD-DVD and they're a good partner of ours in that respect so it was very fortuitous. King Kong is a great title. Everyone is going to love it and see that in HD-DVD. And maybe, down the road, some other titles will be in there. So, no. It was not linked directly to the Peter Jackson partnership.

Q: Peter, how do you feel about the PlayStation 3 price reduction in Japan?

Peter Moore: Probably a lot better than they do. (Laughter.)

Q: Do you think they will do the same for North America and Europe and how do you think that will affect Microsoft?

Peter Moore: Well, I guess not. Because if I understand Kutaragi-san's comments, that he had spoken with US retailers and they thought that the $599.99 price point was fabulous, and I can't remember the exact objective, but it's a great value for the money for all of the features that are in there. And the same conversation happened in the European market. Now with that pushed out (the delayed PS3 launch in Europe), they have to worry about that less. I don't anticipate you'll see a price drop. That will be a little challenging to the Sony P&L [Ed note: P&L is a "profit and loss" statement]. When you do price drops like that, that comes right off the bottom line. It's not easy to do. So I think that Kutaragi-san alluded to people's concern of the price, which was too high. I think, to his credit, he was blunt about the fact they were worried it wouldn't get the adoption it needed to. Particularly with the announcement we made Wednesday of Blue Dragon at 28,000 yen and the announcement of the competitive price point. So I think he decided he had to do what he had to do.

Q: When the PlayStation 2 was in its second fall season, Xbox and GameCube launched. Sony had all these fantastic games from both first and third party companies -- Ico, Grand Theft Auto III, Devil May Cry, Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance, Final Fantasy X, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty and so on. That second fall was a major launching point for Sony's domination of that generation. This is Microsoft's second fall season, and a lot of the first-party titles have been dropped. The list includes Forza 2, I guess we can discuss the semantics behind the delay of Mass Effect, but that's not coming out this year, Too Human, and Crackdown. What's left from a first-party point of view is Gears of War and Viva Pi¿ata. I'm not trying to downplay these titles, but didn't Microsoft want to have a more robust fall lineup than this? And are you worried that this fall won't be as strong as possible for Microsoft?

Peter Moore: Naw. I feel pretty good. While obviously first-party games are important, you have to look at the entire portfolio. When I look at the games available and if you're in the market to buy a console this year, I feel petty good that what we have to offer is not something you say, "There is nothing there for me. I have no interest in those 160 Xbox 360 games." This is a long-term play, and the ability to have something in the spring of 2007 is also important. That never happened in spring 2006. Remember, we shipped everything at launch and we had a quiet period. We don't want to let that happen again. So being able to flow Gears of War and Viva Pi¿ata into whatever titles will come in, Forza 2, Crackdown, Too Human, Shadow Run, all those titles over a six-month period, that's almost one, I'll be gracious and say, one triple A title every month. They're certainly triple A potential in any case.

Q: Is Microsoft looking at other months, you know, besides the typical holiday months, to begin publishing titles?

Peter Moore: Yeah, you do try to merchandize your collection. When I say merchandize, that's a retail term for stuff goes here and stuff goes there, to get some balance. It's gets incredibly crowded the week before Thanksgiving, as you well know, and you often look to give your games some room, some oxygen, so you can do your marketing correctly and give them some opportunity. What we have seen over the last three or four years is that January is a pretty strong software month. This phenomenon of gift cards and the like continues to grow. Now, after this last holiday, gift card sales are in the billions of dollars. So you want to merchandize your role and you don't want to have four or five months without first-party exclusives out there. That's certainly part of the plan.

Q: So you have a lot of first-party games coming, but are there others? Will you be making more announcements?

Peter Moore: If more games were coming out this year, you'd know about it. We're not in the business of, "Whoa! There is a game we never told you about shipping on Tuesday!" This business is about creating awareness of a title months and months in advance. We roll through the six or seven titles we just went over and without Halo 3 as coming in 2007 on top of that, that's a lot. And then there are things we haven't talked a lot about coming at the back end of 2007. So you have to look at the portfolio of management, you also have to work with your third-party partners to make sure that you take a complete portfolio view, not just one that's good for the first party, and we're pretty proud of where we are.

Q: At this point, is it pretty safe to say that Japan is lost for you guys&#Array;

Peter Moore: No. Not lost at all. But go ahead; you're entitled to your opinion.

Q: Do you see Japanese games complementing the West?

Peter Moore: It certainly adds flavor. When you think of Blue Dragon in particular, you could argue that that's some kind of broadening content. It's attractive to a younger consumer because of its anime style. Lost Odyssey has the ability, in my mind, to attract gamers that have potentially been waiting for the PlayStation platform for a number of years. Sakaguchi's titles in particular have been as strong as anything to help build PlayStation loyalty and I'm glad he's on our team. But Japan is not lost. Bear with me in the holiday season. We made some very strong announcements at TGS and in particular those two titles we talked about, and Lost Planet. And by the way, Dead Rising and Lost Planet are direct outcomes of our engagement in the Japanese market with not only the Japanese retailers but Japanese publishers. I couldn't be happier with the performance of Dead Rising and I couldn't be more excited with what I'm seeing in the latest builds of Lost Planet.